Re: Ejective Consonants a sign of Mountain Living

On 14/06/2013 03:50, Padraic Brown wrote: [snip] ... Well, maybe the Nepalese, like the Tibetans, breathe a a faster rate than others in high altitudes ;)

Message 1 of 18
, Jun 14, 2013

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On 14/06/2013 03:50, Padraic Brown wrote:
[snip]
>
> As far as ejective mountain dwellers, surely the
> Nepalese, living as they do in the Himalayas, ought to
> be ejecting their consonants all over the place?

Well, maybe the Nepalese, like the Tibetans, breathe a a
faster rate than others in high altitudes ;)

"The only region where ejective languages were absent was
the Tibetan plateau. This could be because people living in
the region have become uniquely adapted to the low oxygen at
high altitudes.
Studies have shown that Tibetan people breath at a faster
rate than other high altitude populations and they have also
been found to make more efficient use of the oxygen in the air."

Or maybe there's something about the Himalayas that do not
encourage the development of ejective consonants.

Folk dialectology often makes fanciful causal claims about the effect of physical geography on phonetics. I imagine it would be very difficult to collect data

Message 2 of 18
, Jun 14, 2013

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Folk dialectology often makes fanciful causal claims about the effect of
physical geography on phonetics.

I imagine it would be very difficult to collect data of sufficient quality
and quantity to test such claims empirically. What you'd really need is the
frequency of ejective allophones in dialects. I doubt that data exists
accessibly for English, let alone for less intensively studied languages.

But given that we know mountainous areas better preserve linguistic
diversity and that linguistic homogenization tends to eradicate the marked,
it may be that something related to ejectives is marked and therefore less
likely to be lost when in mountains.

> On 6/13/2013 4:20 AM, BPJ wrote:
>
>> 2013-06-13 08:32, John Q skrev:
>>
>>> Well here's an interesting new theory -- Ejective consonants are
>>> apparently far more likely to be found in languages spoken in or near
>>> mountain ranges:
>>>
>>> http://www.telegraph.co.uk/**science/science-news/10117037/**
>>> Living-in-the-mountains-can-**change-the-way-you-speak.html<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/10117037/Living-in-the-mountains-can-change-the-way-you-speak.html>
>>>
>>>
>>> --John Q.
>>>
>>>
>> Like Lakhota? >;-)
>>
>> (Sorry, couldn't help myself...)
>>
>> /bpj
>>
>
> "The researchers, however, found that 87 per cent of languages that use
> ejectives were found within 300 miles of an area of high altitude." Which
> implies that 13 percent of languages with ejectives were found more than
> 300 miles away from high altitude areas.
>
> It's an interesting idea, associating phonological features with
> geography. Even if it turns out to be coincidental, a conworld could use
> some idea like this for the languages spoken in different areas. But why
> would high altitude be associated with ejectives? More efficient use of
> breath?
>

Roman Rausch

... And drink tea all the time because water is easier to boil? :-) Looking at the WALS map for rare consonants

Message 3 of 18
, Jun 14, 2013

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>As far as ejective mountain dwellers, surely the Nepalese, living as they
>do in the Himalayas, ought to be ejecting their consonants all over the
>place?

And drink tea all the time because water is easier to boil? :-)

Looking at the WALS map for rare consonants (http://wals.info/feature/19A?tg_format=map&v1=cfff&v2=d000&v3=cff0&v4=s00d&v5=cd00&v6=dd00&v7=sd00) I noticed that interdental spirants seem to occur more often in languages situated near coastlines: English, Greek, Albanian, Spanish, Icelandic for Indo-European; but also Swahili, Aleut, Fijian; a cluster of languages near the South China Sea, a cluster in Mexico, and so on.
If I come up with a tentative reason for how maritime climate or seafaring can make you stick your tongue out, I can write a paper. :-)

Matthew Boutilier

... perhaps the higher air pressure at sea level makes it easier to distinguish e.g. /T/ from /f/ or /D/ from /v/ over longer distances. the sound has a

Message 4 of 18
, Jun 14, 2013

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> Looking at the WALS map for rare consonants (
> http://wals.info/feature/19A?tg_format=map&v1=cfff&v2=d000&v3=cff0&v4=s00d&v5=cd00&v6=dd00&v7=sd00)
> I noticed that interdental spirants seem to occur more often in languages
> situated near coastlines: English, Greek, Albanian, Spanish, Icelandic for
> Indo-European; but also Swahili, Aleut, Fijian; a cluster of languages near
> the South China Sea, a cluster in Mexico, and so on.
> If I come up with a tentative reason for how maritime climate or seafaring
> can make you stick your tongue out, I can write a paper. :-)
>

perhaps the higher air pressure at sea level makes it easier to distinguish
e.g. /T/ from /f/ or /D/ from /v/ over longer distances. the sound has a
thicker medium to travel through and loses less of its phonetic
distinctiveness; which is why Cockney - a Germanic dialect that is no
longer spoken near a coast - has neutralized the T~f/D~v difference!

but in all seriousness, the claim that geography is *causally* related to
linguistic features strikes me as somewhat insane (or overly ambitious at
best). languages that use triconsonantal roots are disproportionately
located in *desert*; is there something deserty about speaking this kind of
language? i doubt it! (also, we know that Proto-Semitic had ejective
consonants, and that part of the world is quite flat.)

matt

Jörg Rhiemeier

Hallo conlangers! ... Most proper linguists consider such correlations of linguistic features with terrain types, climate zones or similar factors

Message 5 of 18
, Jun 14, 2013

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Hallo conlangers!

On Friday 14 June 2013 02:54:17 Herman Miller wrote:

> [...]
>
> "The researchers, however, found that 87 per cent of languages that use
> ejectives were found within 300 miles of an area of high altitude."
> Which implies that 13 percent of languages with ejectives were found
> more than 300 miles away from high altitude areas.
>
> It's an interesting idea, associating phonological features with
> geography. Even if it turns out to be coincidental, a conworld could use
> some idea like this for the languages spoken in different areas. But why
> would high altitude be associated with ejectives? More efficient use of
> breath?

Most proper linguists consider such correlations of linguistic
features with terrain types, climate zones or similar factors
insignificant. But indeed, in a conworld, there may be patterns
of that kind. In my Hesperic family, I have decided that the
more northerly languages have larger phoneme inventories than
those spoken in the south, which somehow feels "right" to me
but probably is not well-supported by real-world linguistic data,
at least not in Europe where the Hesperic languages are spoken.

> Hallo conlangers!
>
> On Friday 14 June 2013 02:54:17 Herman Miller wrote:
>
>> [...]
>>
>> "The researchers, however, found that 87 per cent of languages that use
>> ejectives were found within 300 miles of an area of high altitude."
>> Which implies that 13 percent of languages with ejectives were found
>> more than 300 miles away from high altitude areas.
>>
>> It's an interesting idea, associating phonological features with
>> geography. Even if it turns out to be coincidental, a conworld could use
>> some idea like this for the languages spoken in different areas. But why
>> would high altitude be associated with ejectives? More efficient use of
>> breath?
>
> Most proper linguists consider such correlations of linguistic
> features with terrain types, climate zones or similar factors
> insignificant. But indeed, in a conworld, there may be patterns
> of that kind. In my Hesperic family, I have decided that the
> more northerly languages have larger phoneme inventories than
> those spoken in the south, which somehow feels "right" to me
> but probably is not well-supported by real-world linguistic data,
> at least not in Europe where the Hesperic languages are spoken.

That reminds me of the controversial paper "Phonemic Diversity Supports a Serial Founder Effect Model of Language Expansion from Africa" by Atkinson (who was recently discussed in connection with the paper about "hyper-conserved" lexemes); but his claim was that phoneme inventory size *decreases* with distance from Africa.

Another folk phonetics claim I've read somewhere was that a far northern variety or family in NA (I think it was Aleut maybe) lacks labials because its speakers often used to put labrets in their lower lips. I don't remember the exact details but I think Aleut does have /m/ at least.

On the other hand, I have a lot of trouble pronouncing labial stops (and IIRC /m/) when I've been in the cold for a while. In such cases I can't quite make lip closure so it comes out more fricative-like.

Anthony Miles

Rhea Silvia on Ceres is 22 miles high - I bet Rheasilvians speak in nothing but ejectives!

Message 7 of 18
, Jun 14, 2013

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Rhea Silvia on Ceres is 22 miles high - I bet Rheasilvians speak in nothing but ejectives!

Padraic Brown

... Oh, quite naturally my good sir! An excellent and astute observation that will bear considerable fruit and tie all loose ends together: After all, the

> > As far as ejective mountain dwellers, surely the Nepalese, living as
> > they do in the Himalayas, ought to be ejecting their consonants all
> > over the place?
>
> And drink tea all the time because water is easier to boil? :-)

Oh, quite naturally my good sir! An excellent and astute observation that
will bear considerable fruit and tie all loose ends together: After all,
the distant lands of Asia, where, the historiographer P. Cornelius
Bombastico assures us, based upon the maps of the chief cartographer of
Megas Alexander himself, one Hippophilos Xyphographico, who made the first
great Atlas of maps of the regions where Alexander's armies wandered, the
Nepali do dwell in the vicinity of Shangri La, are lands renowned for all
manner of cultural refinements, was, in point of fact the original
homeland of tea, a plant crop grown and consumed in vast quantities in,
for example, China (where they call the stuff "tshay"), among other
countries in the surrounds. Now, as is well known to anyone familiar with
the works on the history of agriculture, for example, the copious and
lavishly illustrated twelve volume work composed by Cn. Agrigola or the
excessively detailed if not so copiously illustrated work of Mn.
Latifundio, primitive Men, in those golden prehistorical ages before the
ravages of Flood and Frost Giant, knew nothing at all about agriculture,
and therefore nothing about the culture of tea. It was not until some
years after the flood waters washed away the last traces of the works of
the civilizations of the Giants, all the surviving children of Ziusudra
were living upon the tops of what were once high mountains, now having
become isolated islands, or else were compelled to wander the seas upon
rafts and boats, preying upon any and sundry other seafaring folks as they
chanced to meet. Now, as the great historiographer Musa ben Imramico avers,
there was in those days, though we can reasonably presume there were in
earlier times more, only one language in the world, on account of there
being only the household of Deukalion who survived the ravaging floods and
storms of the previous Age. It was at this time, according to the venerable
scholar and historiographer of the East Goths, one Wulfa wan Dunnaqen,
who, having travelled extensively in those distant lands and having
learned much of the ancient history of the world otherwise long forgotten
in the clouded and obscured mysts of mythology in the West, that, a great
light was seen to shine over the Eastfolds, and this being in the evening,
rather surprised one local fellow by the name of Atthman, who, being
attracted by the rapid descent of said light, went over there with his
older son, Cynno, to investigate. The great light was thought by many
to be a falling star, as freuqently used to fall to Earth in the previous
Ages, but some held it to be a falling angel. For as the venerable sawyer
Hamilcar of New Qades tells us in his work De Aggelibus, in the days
anterior to the Flood, the great angel Lucifer had been cast out with his
armies and were seen to fall from on high in great streaks of burning
light. But upon arriving in the Eastfolds, Atthman and Cynno soon found
that the cause was rather more startling in nature, for, there, they
found neither fallen star nor fallen angel but rather beheld a great
golden swan, spewing and sputtering steam, and having opened its
posterior, out came two men, one wearing a kind of fish bowl upon his
head, while the other wore only loose white robes and a rakishly combed
beard of grey. According to Musa, Atthman asks the stranger "who are you?
and why did you crawl out of a golden goose's butt?" To which the stranger
replies: "Me, I'm Enoch, and this here is me chum, O-Say-Reese, and that's
no goose, lad, gold nor otherwise, that's me Vimana Mark VII. A beaut, no?
Anywho, where is everybody? I just left here a while back on the 'Mother
Ship' - and oh boy!, you've never seen such a wonderful craft as the old
Mother Ship! - and there were people all over the place! Say, where can I
get a hot cup of tea hereabouts? I'm more parched than the great sandy
desert!" "Sad to say, old man, most everyone's gone. Big flood a few
years back washed all the Giants anyway, and most humans too. Er, what's
a 'desert' and what's 'tea'?" Needless to say, old Enoch was Not Amused,
there being no tea to be had anywhere in the vicinity. So, according to
wan Dunnaqen, he got back into his Vimana Mark VII, instructing
O-Say-Reese to teach these primitive people "how to bloody well grow some
tea, and take a bath and so forth". And with that, he packed up his golden
goose and shot back up into the sky, just as he had come down. Now,
O-Say-Reese stayed on a while and taught Atthman the arts of agriculture.
But Atthman was more of a grazer and didn't take too kindly to having to
root about in the dirt and muck, and thus called upon his son Cynno to
take over the farm, and this one took such a shine to the task at hand
there was no stopping him. And so, Cynno applied his skills at farming to
all sorts of plants, well known even to the modern day, such as, for
example, apples, corn, rice, hemp, poppies, cocoa and of course the
wonderful rayon bean. Now, according to Agricola, it was the custom in
those days that the discoverer of a new plant or animal also earned the
privilege of naming the said new plant or animal. For example, Cynno's
brother, Appellias, was the first to discover the last remaining herd of
hairy olifants while out tending his flocks by night, when, having been
asked by his friend Josephat what all the stamping and trumpeting was
about, Appellias could only reply "AAAAAAUGHHH!" before being trod upon
by the enraged pachyderm. Josephat, it turned out, upon returning home
is said to have kept muttering, over and over again, "I have seen the
olifant, and no mistake!", and so the name stuck. And so it was that Cynno
took to naming all the new plants he brought under domestication within
the auspices of his new "mega-latifundical farming corporation", or
MegaFarmCo. In time, Cynno discovered a certain kind of herb growing in
the hill country beyond the confines of the latifundium and found that it
was edible and without distressing side effects, such as, for example,
the time when he discovered senna and suffered from flux for a fortnight,
which when its leaves are dried, was found to make a wonderful, bitter
yet full flavored and refreshing drink, especially when chilled over
crunchy waters. This plant he called "ysset'ttshaya" and brewed it by the
gallon in great glass globes up on the sunny slopes of the hills outside
the latifundium. Now, in after years, as Musa tells us, Yahweh having at
last defeated Tehom at whist, thus causing the waters to again separate
and, having pulled the plug from the drains at the bottom of the world
sea, and the waters thereof having receded, this left all sorts of newly
opened real estate for Cynno's newly founded land-scheme corporation to
exploit. The descendants of Noe thus spread out into all the lands around
the now exposed island-mountains, taking with them not only their
penchant for freshly brewed herbal teas, but also their ur-name for the
delicious beverage in question, 'ttshaya', carrying the same into the east
and south, where, in subsequent ages, the inhabitants of Chatai and
Bharat alike call the stuff by a name in a slightly eroded mode of the
ancient: 'chai'; while in the West, far from the lofty mountain home of
their ancient ancestors, the folks of Rum and Phazzania alike call it by
an even further eroded name: 'tey'. Therefore, it can clearly be seen as
demonstrated by Iuuencus Grammaticus, that tea was indeed first brewed,
and continues to be assiduously consumed, by those hardy mountain men,
fresh off the boat in early post-deluge times, and also that in those
distant and tranquil days, the strongly ejected stop consonants were
everywhere in evidence. Q. E. D. -- the tea drinking Nepalese of the
high Himalayas are the modern day ejective spitting, tea brewing,
mountain dwelling descendants of the ancients with whose language theirs
bears a striking similarity in this regard; also, the similarly tea
drinking, but non Nepalese of the lowlands (i.e., the Nether Lands), have,
in the course of wandering away from their mountainous urheimat, lost
their ejectives, though not their penchant for a spot of tea.

Padraic

> Looking at the WALS map for rare consonants (http://wals.info/feature/19A?tg_format=map&v1=cfff&v2=d000&v3=cff0&v4=s00d&v5=cd00&v6=dd00&v7=sd00)
> I noticed that interdental spirants seem to occur more often
> in languages situated near coastlines: English, Greek,
> Albanian, Spanish, Icelandic for Indo-European; but also
> Swahili, Aleut, Fijian; a cluster of languages near the
> South China Sea, a cluster in Mexico, and so on.
> If I come up with a tentative reason for how maritime
> climate or seafaring can make you stick your tongue out, I
> can write a paper. :-)
>

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